Valerie Vaz: The stakeholders may not have asked for it, but that does not mean that people cannot have an idea of their own, take soundings or look at the face of  the Bill and see what strikes them. I have not missed the point, as the Minister said, because clause 2(1)(b) says that the OFT is needed
“to encourage competition between English higher education providers in connection with the provision of higher education”.
Anything to do with students, universities or higher education is also about collaboration and public good. I wanted to flag up the fact that the name, as it currently stands, does not incorporate the idea of putting students at the heart of it, for reasons that I will not go through again. It is open to very clever civil servants to come up with something that reflects this debate. With that, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 122,in schedule 1, page63,line18, at end insert—
‘( ) At least one of the ordinary members appointed under sub-paragraph (1)(d) must, at the time of their appointment, be currently engaged in the representation or promotion of the interests of individual students, or students generally, on higher education courses provided by higher education providers.”
This amendment would ensure that at least one of the members must be a student representative.
Amendment 3, in schedule 1,page63,line37, at end insert—
‘(2A) The members appointed under subsection (1) shall appoint two further members (“the student representatives”) who—
(a) are persons—
(i) enrolled on a higher education course of a registered provider,
(ii) elected as representatives of a students’ union, or
(iii) elected as representatives of the National Union of Students, and
(b) are considered by the members of the OfS able to represent, or promote the interests of, a broad range of students.
(2B) For the purposes of subsection (2A), “course” means any graduate or postgraduate course.”
This amendment would require there to be two student representatives as members of the OfS.

Wes Streeting: Given the nature of the role of board members, those people would not be token; they would in fact have serious duties and responsibilities, and their voices and valuable perspectives would be heard at the heart of discussions. I might argue, by the way, that patient interests really ought to be represented on the board of the Care Quality Commission, but that is certainly outside the scope of the Bill. I have a serious point: I urge the hon. Gentleman and the Minister to agree with the new Prime Minister, who has said some interesting things since her elevation to the highest office about the importance of having worker and consumer representatives on company boards. That is an interesting point that ought to be addressed at the heart of the Bill.
Whether we believe that students are consumers of higher education or we prefer to see them as co-producers, both those visions would be served by these amendments, because students’ voices would be heard on the board of the office for students. I propose that there should be two student representatives, because I found—particularly in the higher education sector, —hat it was often helpful for there to be someone else who shared my perspective and experience when I was sat at the table with people who had often been around for some time, had been through the mill and had a great deal of experience. That principle has been supported by the evidence that the Committee has gathered. It is regrettable that we had only one NUS representative in, and for only 15 minutes. We had two GuildHE representatives in for an hour. In fact, we heard a whole range of perspectives  from just the universities represented during our evidence gathering, but there was very limited time for students. I hope that we do not make the same mistake with the architecture of the higher education system.
Placing students on the board of the office for students would bring to life the Minister’s commitment that the new body will place students at the heart of its work. We might have a debate about the best mechanism for that and the appointments process. I have suggested, for example, that the board itself should appoint student representatives, there might be some chopping and changing as a result of turnover or churn, and the Secretary of State may not want to get bogged down in annual or biannual appointments.
We can debate implementation and perhaps even tidy it up on Report, but at this stage I would like the Government to commit to including students on the board of the office for students. That is not much to ask. It would not have a great cost, but there would be an opportunity cost of excluding students. Students have a valuable perspective to offer. There are countless examples of NUS representatives, student union representatives and students themselves making valuable contributions to university governing bodies and higher education bodies and enhancing the quality of our higher education sector as a result. I commend these amendments to the Committee and hope for a favourable hearing from the Minister.

Amendment proposed: 122,in schedule 1, page63,line18, at end insert—
‘( ) At least one of the ordinary members appointed under sub-paragraph (1)(d) must, at the time of their appointment, be currently engaged in the representation or promotion of the interests of individual students, or students generally, on higher education courses provided by higher education providers.”—
This amendment would ensure that at least one of the members must be a student representative.
The Committee divided:
Ayes 9, Noes 11.

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 124,in schedule 1, page63,line24, at end insert “or further education providers”.
This amendment would ensure experience of Higher Education at Further Education providers is taken into account.
Amendment 125,in schedule 1, page63,line37, at end insert—
‘(h) working to improve equality of opportunity and the widening of access and participation within higher education, including via part-time, adult and lifelong learning.”
This amendment would ensure improving access and widening participation is considered when appointing board members.
Amendment 126,in schedule 1, page63,line37, at end insert—
‘(i) being an employee of a higher education provider, particularly in the capacity of teaching or researching.”.
This amendment would ensure the Secretary of State had regard for the experience of Higher Education employees, teaching or research staff.

Gordon Marsden: The aim of these amendments is again to extend and clarify our view of the direction in which the Bill should travel. I like to hope that other members of the Committee feel likewise. I will take them in order.
Amendment 123 is relatively straightforward but contains an important principle. It marks a slight dividing line between Government and Opposition. We had a lot of discussion about consumers in the previous debate—rightly so, because we wanted to take the Government at their  word, when it came to their interpretation. Surely it should be a principle that all the related criteria referred to in this part of the Bill, which talks about the desirability of the proposals, should be of equal importance. There should not be a perception of them being in a hierarchy.
The Government have suggested that the new office for students will be explicitly pro-competition. I am sure, as we go through the Bill, we will have a number of significant debates on amendments that will draw out what the Government mean by being pro-competition. There is a risk—I put it no stronger than that at this stage, as we will want to return to the subject in detail when we talk of providers—that if we encapsulate that preference in the criteria, that element will take priority over other functions, which could harm the quality of higher education and act against the wider student interest.
We believe that members of the office for students should have prior experience and understanding of all aspects of the work of the OFS board, and that should be made explicit in legislation.
Amendment 124 addresses what I hope we will discover from the Minister’s reply is a drafting error. We are asking for the words “or further education providers” to be included in the list of things that members of the board should have experience of. There is a very straightforward reason for that. Further education colleges in England have provided and increasingly provide a range of higher education, including higher-level skills and qualifications for students entering the workforce and individuals wishing to pursue a higher education qualification.
I speak with some feeling, although I do not have a university in my constituency. We might have had one in the 1960s; it was between us and Lancaster, but unfortunately the Conservative council at the time thought that revolting students—because that is, of course, what people were doing in the ’60s—were not what they needed in Blackpool, so it went to Lancaster. However, we do have an excellent further education college—Blackpool and the Fylde College—which has thousands of higher education students and was one of the first FE colleges to be awarded independent degree-awarding powers.
The direction of travel in that respect is absolutely clear—or at least I hope it is. Some 159,000 people study at higher education colleges, and colleges deliver 85% of HNCs, 82% of HNDs and 58% of foundation degrees. Given what the White Paper said about the crucial importance of skills and vocational education in driving the objectives that the Government describe—indeed, the Minister said that when he introduced the debate in the House of Commons—I would have thought it was a no-brainer, if I can put it that way, that we should consider looking at people who have worked in the further education sector and have specifically promoted and developed higher education degrees.
This is a good opportunity for the Government to respond to the concern, which I and other people have raised, that further education colleges and their role in higher education got a raw deal in the White Paper and the Bill. On Second Reading, I raised the forecast figure in the Government’s technical paper for the number of further education colleges that would be delivering higher education as a result of this Bill. The figure for 2027-28 is exactly the same figure as that projected for 2018-19.  Now, perhaps the Minister will say, “Oh well, that’s speculative” or whatever, but there is a suspicion—I will put it no stronger than that—in the further education sector that when the Government talk about the importance of new and existing providers of higher education, the further education sector is not absolutely at the forefront of their mind. For those reasons, it is desirable, and frankly in the Government’s interest, that this modest amendment, which simply identifies what is actually the case at the moment—that more than 10% of higher education is delivered by FE colleges—should be incorporated in the list of criteria, not the obligations, that should be considered when the members of the board are appointed.
In amendment 125, we are developing and taking forward the same principle of widening participation and social mobility. We are suggesting again that they need to be made explicit criteria in the Bill. Again, the Labour Opposition are putting forward our strong view of how important widening participation and improving equality of opportunity and access are. I am not going to speak in detail about the inclusion of the phrase
“part-time, adult and lifelong learning”,
because there will be other opportunities when we debate other amendment, but we want the Government to put money where their mouth is, and their mouth has been very eloquent about the need to improve and widen participation. Again, I cannot see any reason why those measures should not be included.
Indeed, the previous Prime Minister made great play of this issue at the beginning of the year, and I have no reason to believe that that position is not supported by the current Prime Minister. The Minister herself has spoken eloquently about the need to get universities and higher education institutions to step up to the plate.
The Association of Colleges is supportive of the Government’s measure to widen participation and, as I have already said, colleges play a key role in advancing the position of disadvantaged black and minority ethnic people, as do many of the new universities. The old universities need to do more; I think the Minister and I agree on that.
These particular amendments, which are relatively modest, would simply put in the Bill at this very significant point the issues that the Government think are important for the board to consider. As one of my hon. Friends said earlier, the appointment of this first board—the people who are on it and the criteria used to appoint them—is crucial, regarding the message that is to be sent out.
The final amendment in this grouping, amendment 126, addresses a really important point. We are proposing that another of the criteria should be to ensure that the Secretary of State has regard for the experience of higher education employees—teaching or research staff. I would add, although it is not formally in the amendment, that the Government should consider the experience of all staff who work in the HE sector at whatever level. However, for the purposes of the amendment, we are talking about teaching and research staff.
Again, that is an issue that the University and College Union feels strongly about and we support it, because the success of a university does not only depend on  having excellent vice-chancellors or excellent managerial staff; it depends on the work of everybody in that university, from the highest professor to the most modest junior lecturer, or whoever. I would have thought that having that broad mix of people included in the list of people with desirable attributes from whom the Government wish to produce this first board for the OFS would set an admirable precedent.
Those are the reasons why we are tabling these specific amendments. We do so to broaden and—if I can put it this way—make more catholic, with a small c, the criteria and the pool of talent from whom the Secretary of State will be able to draw the members of the first OFS board.

Wes Streeting: I beg to move amendment 10, in schedule 1,page64,line6, leave out “is responsible for reporting” and insert “must report”
This amendment, together with amendments 11 to 14, would require that the Director of Fair Access and Participation reports directly to the Secretary of State and that the report produced be laid before Parliament.

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 11,in schedule 1, page64,line7, after first “OfS”, insert “and Secretary of State”
See Explanatory Statement for amendment 10.
Amendment 12,in schedule 1, page64,line9, leave out “may” and insert “must”
See Explanatory Statement for amendment 10.
Amendment 128,in schedule 1, page64,line9, leave out
“the other members of the OfS”
and insert
“the Board of the OfS”
This amendment would ensure that the Director for Fair Access and Participation reports to the Board Members of the OfS on performance of access and participation functions.
Amendment 13,in schedule 1, page64,line9, after “OfS”, insert “and Secretary of State”
See Explanatory Statement for amendment 10.
Amendment 14, in schedule 1,page64,line12, at end insert—
“( ) The Director must prepare a report under sub-paragraphs (1) and (2) at an appropriate time but at least annually.
( ) The Director must send the report to the Secretary of State.
( ) The Secretary of State must lay the report before Parliament.”
See Explanatory Statement for amendment 10.

Wes Streeting: The amendments follow a similar theme to the previous group, being about the architecture of the higher education system and in particular safeguarding the position the Office for Fair Access has occupied since it was first created.
I will take members back to that debate in 2003-04. OFFA was one of the important concessions—one of the surviving concessions, I have to say—of the debate surrounding the introduction of variable tuition fees in the Higher Education Act 2004. OFFA was born out of a concern about the risk that increasing tuition fees might jeopardise fair access to the most elite universities, particularly if they are charging higher variable fees, and a broadening concern that it might jeopardise widening participation more generally among students from under-represented backgrounds.
There were also concerns, regardless of the risks that were considered at the time of the discussion of that legislation, that progress in both widening access to selective universities and widening participation in education more generally was being made far too slowly, so the role of OFFA and the director of fair access was considered for all of the reasons that have already been discussed. It is important that the director for fair access and participation occupies a prominent and important role, and I am grateful to the Minister for indicating that he is looking very carefully at that. In that context, I think Parliament needs to think about its role in relation to safeguarding fair access to higher education.
The amendments would provide for the director for fair access and participation to report to the Secretary of State, and for the Secretary of State in turn to lay the report before Parliament. I think that is important. We have seen in debates in this Parliament, the previous one and many before it that the issues of social mobility and fair access to universities is of importance to all Members, regardless of whether they represent a constituency with a large student population or areas that have particular social disadvantage. Given that widespread interest, and given that progress is still too slow, I think it is reasonable to expect that Parliament would have some oversight over progress or lack of progress, and an opportunity to debate that accordingly.
We know from all of the evidence that exists that fair access to higher education is not simply the responsibility of universities; it stretches back far earlier, in terms of both the education system and broader aspects of social policy. In that context, it is important to give all Members an opportunity to look carefully at the issues contained therein. Given that, I hope the amendments will receive a favourable hearing from the Minister and that he can consider them as he will be considering the amendments we have just debated.

Paul Blomfield: I will only make a brief contribution, which is to pull up on the point I was making about the Select Committee report on this specific point. I will share the brief recommendation we made as a Committee, with the endorsement of every member of the Committee:
“In order to best promote widening participation, and to help the Government meet its own targets, we believe it important that the decisions of the Director for Fair Access are seen as fully independent and not subject to being overruled by any higher  authority within the same organisation. The ability for this post to report direct to the Minister and to Parliament should therefore be built into the new higher education architecture.”
I think that crystallises the point made powerfully a moment ago by my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North when moving his amendments. I hope, and I am sure, that we can reach the same accommodation if the Minister is able to respond in the same terms as he did to the previous group of amendments.